Supply chain attacks targeting the JavaScript ecosystem have evolved into sophisticated operations combining domain manipulation with social engineering.
On September 8, 2025, threat actors launched a coordinated phishing campaign aimed at compromising high-profile NPM developers.
The attack successfully infiltrated the accounts of developer Josh Junon, known as “qix,” and targeted at least four other maintainers, exposing the vulnerability of software repositories to credential-harvesting tactics.
The compromised packages represented nearly 2.8 billion weekly downloads, positioning this incident among the most significant supply chain threats in NPM’s history.
The phishing emails masqueraded as official NPM security communications, claiming recipients needed to update their two-factor authentication credentials to prevent account suspension.
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This urgent messaging created psychological pressure that bypassed traditional user skepticism.
The attacker sent communications from support@npmjs[.]help, a spoofed domain designed to mirror legitimate NPM infrastructure while remaining visually convincing to unsuspecting developers.
Group-IB analysts identified that despite successfully passing standard email authentication protocols including SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, multiple technical indicators revealed the campaign’s malicious intent.
Each email contained a customized phishing link directing victims to a credential harvesting site hosted on npmjs.help. Once developers entered their credentials into the cloned login page, attackers gained full access to their NPM accounts.
The JavaScript Clipper Payload and Cryptocurrency Targeting
With account access secured, threat actors inserted JavaScript clipper malware into twenty popular NPM packages.
This sophisticated payload monitored browser and application activity specifically for cryptocurrency wallet interactions.
When users initiated transactions involving Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, Tron, Litecoin, or Bitcoin Cash, the malware intercepted wallet addresses and replaced them with attacker-controlled alternatives, effectively diverting cryptocurrency transfers without user awareness.
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This targeted infection mechanism exemplified the precision of modern supply chain compromise operations.
Group-IB’s Business Email Protection platform successfully detected this threat through comprehensive multi-layer analysis.
The detection leveraged domain intelligence via RDAP checks, brand impersonation algorithms, content analysis identifying social engineering patterns, URL inspection revealing credential-capturing functionality, and behavioral analysis exposing fraudulent interface replication.
Following remediation, affected packages were reverted to clean versions and developers regained full account control, preventing widespread downstream compromise.
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